Is it okay to be ambitious?

I first thought about ambition in high school, after reading Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar. Brutus and his fellow conspirators justify assassinating Caesar, arguing that he was becoming too ambitious — that his growing hunger for power posed a threat to the Roman Republic. In the famous funeral oration that follows, Mark Antony sets out to defend Caesar. With devastating irony, he lists Caesar’s actions: refusing the crown when it was offered, weeping for the poor, filling Rome’s coffers with spoils. Did these amount to ambition, asks Antony rhetorically. “Ambition,” he asserts, “must be made of sterner stuff.”

In Shakespeare’s telling, ambition is therefore a negative trait: a moral failing that corrodes judgment. Caesar, Antony insists, was not ambitious in that sense. This was also how my parents understood ambition. Wanting to excel at what one is doing was admirable; craving for power, privilege, position or wealth was reprehensible. I was brought up to despise ambition. In later years though I realised that this view was incomplete. Ambition is also understood in a positive sense. It denotes aspiration, striving for difficult goals and a drive for success. We urge young people to be ambitious; institutions speak proudly of ambitious plans; employers seek ambitious candidates; leaders set ambitious goals. The world would be a poorer place without ambition.

My own understanding of ambition has been shaped by experience. I now see a critical distinction between ambition driven by outcomes and ambition driven by validation. The first is about achieving results, improving performance, building institutions and contributing to the collective good. The latter is about external rewards — status, wealth, awards, accolades, and glory. The former is not only acceptable but necessary; the latter is corrosive and needs to be shunned. With this distinction in mind, I have no qualms in admitting that I was ambitious throughout my career. I set demanding goals, worked hard to meet them, and felt genuine disappointment when I fell short. When I stepped down as Governor of the Reserve Bank of India in 2013, effectively ending my formal career in public service, I found myself saying to a friend, “I have no further ambition.” I realised almost immediately that I had misspoken. What I meant was that I was no longer in a hierarchy where success is measured by how high you climb. Ambition in another sense — to do useful work, to do it well, and yes, to do it better than others — had not vanished. Yet, despite this shift in perception, our misgivings about ambition persist. At a family gathering some time ago, a grandmother asked a 10-year-old boy what he wanted to be when he grew up. The child replied that he wanted to play in World Cup Cricket. What followed was a pause, a faint smile, and then a gentle caution: “That’s fine, but don’t become too ambitious.” Everyone nodded, as if a great truth had been told.

Continuing unease

I was unsettled by this exchange. Was this a kindly attempt to protect the child from disappointment? A reminder that ambition has to be proportionate? Or was it a deeper warning — that wanting something too intensely was itself undesirable? That conversation captures our continuing unease with ambition. We admire success, but we distrust desire. We encourage children to do well, but not to want too much. Ambition, we believe, must be in check, lest it tip over into something morally suspect. Part of the confusion arises because we use a single word to describe two very different motivations. Ambition driven by validation encourages constant comparison and perpetual dissatisfaction. I have seen talented people pin their entire self-worth on a single reward or recognition. When it does not come, disappointment hardens into resentment, draining joy from work that once felt meaningful. By contrast, some of the most admirable people I have known are ambitious in quieter ways. I once met a schoolteacher in a far-flung village who told me that her ambition was to see some of her students get into the IIT. Similarly, a doctor in a rural dispensary focused on reducing infections, an entrepreneur trying to improve a product for the sheer joy of achievement, and young IAS and IPS officers in the vast hinterland of the country toiling against all odds to promote welfare and wellbeing are all ambitious in an admirable way. Their ambition is real and exacting, but it is directed at achieving something worthwhile rather than craving for recognition or reward. So, is it okay to be ambitious? Yes, provided we are clear about what we are ambitious for. Like fire, ambition can help or destroy. Used well, it lights the way forward; used badly, it burns the hand that holds it.

(The writer is a former RBI Governor)

subbarao@gmail.com